It’s awhile before we make it out of the truck.
Chapter 41
Thanksgiving
LILA
The Rhodes family Thanksgiving starts early, and is, Slade informs me, an all-day affair.
We’re at Rosemont by nine a.m and ready to be put to work by Daryl.
It’s funny how similar and yet different Rosemont is to the house I grew up at. Both rambling estates than have held generations of the same family, and yet they couldn’t be less alike.
I grew up surrounded by portraits of stern ancestors looking down their noses at me; here there are family photos crowding the walls, plaques and medals dating back to the Rhodes kids’ high school days, Jonah’s drawings everywhere, all given the same consideration and importance as the fine art hanging beside it.
My childhood home was all cold marble and surfaces that gleamed to a mirror-shine, never besmirched by fingerprints or evidence of use; here there are worn wood floors, walls with nicks and scratches from kids bouncing off them, astone fireplace crackling with the wood that Slade and his brothers split themselves—I know, because I’ve watched them do it on cold mornings with their sleeves rolled up and their breath coming in clouds.
At my family home, the kitchen staff spent the day in the service kitchen, preparing food that would barely be touched while out of sight, out of mind.
In the air at Rosemont there’s the smell of butter and sage rolling out of the kitchen where Daryl has had the turkey in the oven since before we woke up. The kitchen is already operating at full capacity.
Sadie is making her—our—mother-in-law’s sweet potato casserole from a recipe card so old it’s barely legible. Jonah is underfoot stealing marshmallows from the bowl in between doing a puzzle with Slade. Walker is peeling potatoes. The twins are in the living room in their bouncy seats, Mari already trying to escape hers.
Slade multitasks, alternating between the puzzle with Jonah and entertaining the twin girls with fuzzy books and wood egg rattlers.
I have a sudden, vivid picture of him as a father, and something inside me lurches painfully.
I can’t torture myself with dreams like that, tempting as they are.
Tanner arrives late, hair still damp from a shower, bearing a 24-pack of beer. “Rhodes fam,” he declares. “Let’s get this party started.”
“One day,” Walker says, “you’re gonna have to bring something more than beer to Thanksgiving.”
Sadie gives Tanner a mischievous look. “Like a wife.”
“Working on it,” he says.
Her eyebrow shoot up. “Oh really? Who’s the lucky girl?”
For some reason, Walker is staring at Tanner with aknowing look on his face. For the first time ever, I see Tanner’s cheeks flush a little.
Tanner offers, “Let’s just say that I know the woman I’m going to marry. She just doesn’t know yet thatshe’sgoing to marryme.”
Sadie’s eyes go wide. Walker looks deeply skeptical.
After putting the beer in the fridge, Tanner distributes hugs to everyone, including me, as he comes to investigate what I’m doing at the counter. At the moment, it’s carefully pressing small pastry leaves onto the top of the pecan pie.
Tanner watches me for a moment. “Damn, Lila. You’re like Martha Stewart.” He steals a pecan from the bowl. “Too bad it’s all wasted on your husband.”
“Lila is a great baker,” Slade says, from somewhere behind me.
His hand finds my waist and he presses a kiss to my cheek, warm and unhurried, like we’re alone in our kitchen and not standing in the middle of his entire family.
Tanner pops another pecan in his mouth and chews, watching us with bright eyes. “Sure. But Slade hates sugar.”
Tanner’s eyes widen, cutting to Slade over my shoulder, like he’s just realized what he said.
I spin around in the silence that’s fallen over the kitchen. Slade is glaring at his brother.
